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Savannah State University officer's gun discharges; bullet lodges in classroom

A Savannah State University public safety officer accidentally discharged a firearm Wednesday morning, sending a bullet through two windows before it came to a stop in a classroom wall.

University spokeswoman Loretta Heyward said the officer’s .45-caliber Glock fired during a demonstration.

The bullet went through a window of the C wing of the Hubert Tech Science Building, where the Department of Public Safety is housed, then through the window of an A wing classroom, where it lodged in the wall.

A class was in session in the room, but no injuries were reported.

According to the chief of public safety, the officer was immediately suspended, Heyward said.

Candace Middleton, a 21-year-old computer science technology major who was in the calculus class when the bullet broke through the window at about 9:25 a.m., said students had been quietly taking notes while discussing a problem given to them by their professor.

“It sounded like the whole window had exploded — shattered,” she said. “We were freaking out. We jumped to the ground and everything, trying to figure out what was going on. … We were looking around for anyone who was out there. We didn’t see anybody. It was pandemonium for a minute.”

She said glass got on at least one student, but no one was hurt. The professor, she said, had walked in front of the window shortly before the bullet came through.

She said he went to get campus police, who then closed off the classroom.

“I had to leave the building because I needed to get away from it,” Middleton said. “I went to another building and sat there for a minute. Then I went to my other class.”

Efforts to contact the professor Wednesday afternoon were unsuccessful.

The identity of the officer was not released Wednesday, and a preliminary incident report from the school’s police department was not available.

Heyward said the officer was “demonstrating the nomenclature of the weapon used by Public Safety here at Savannah State” to new officers when the weapon discharged.

“The round should not have been in the gun during the demonstration,” Heyward said. “That is not standard procedure.”

The Savannah Morning News was unable to reach law enforcement firearm training professionals Wednesday for comment about proper procedure when demonstrating guns.